"And that should serve as proof that the two of us are… the most dangerous duo in this entire world…"

Barely capable of speaking, Bonger was kneeling down. His entire body trembling both with excitement and due to the overwhelming energy that was coursing through his veins. Truth be told, just the aura alone that surrounded his body as soon as he seemed to break through his previous limitations was dangerously close to what I perceived when watching the fight of the absolute monsters with Makay back before I even learned about the existence of this place.

"That seems to be the case."

Eve wasn't stupid enough to fail to notice what was going on and be unable to connect it with what I already told her about the connection between me and Bonger. If just the act of slightly improving my abilities by crafting a random item from the scraps that I found in this place could raise Bonger's potential so high that he could achieve the absolute peak of this world in one instant…

With the face of my beloved one darkening, I could tell that she understood the implications behind this notion.

Yet, rather than focusing on the bad side of being able to grow so explosively, I decided that for now, it would be better to just focus on the things that I had any influence over.

"Either way, let's see how good the simple sword that I aimed for will be. Given Bonger's reaction, I can tell even without him informing me that my crafting abilities… Kinda grew."

Reaching with my hand inside the crafting sphere, I grasped the cold metal of the spike that would soon turn to be a handle. Pulling this yet-to-be-finished weapon, I quickly found a simple piece of wood that used to hold two scraps together before reforming it in my sphere and forcing it down on the said spike. Just a few more touches to add the special profiling for the fingers, and the very first weapon of mine, made in this new continent, saw the light of the day.

At the same time, Bonger looked as if he could only continue to orgasm, with more and more powerful spasms shaking his body whenever I got even a tiny bit closer to finishing this ordinary weapon of mine. By the time I finally presented the final product to the three of us, his complexion turned dark as yet another series of spasm indicated that something seriously wrong was going on.

"I get it…"

Only after a few moments did the physical body of my system reacted to its own situation. Opening his mouth to elaborate on what he just understood, Bonger was about to enlighten me about his discoveries… When the doors leading to the backyard of the smithy gave up, allowing the crazily huge crowd of people to start pouring inside.

"WHAT WAS THAT!?"

"WHERE IS THE ASCENDEE?!"

Soon, there was simply no more room within the confined space of the trash dump, making it increasingly harder for even more people to come in… Yet it didn't seem like anyone treated it as a problem. From what I could tell, just the aura that Bonger spread around itself during his breakthroughs was enough to attract everyone's attention here, making it hard for me to counteract the crowd in any feasible way.

"Ascendee? What do you mean?"

This time it was Bonger's achievement to save us from this pinch. Standing up from the ground on which he was formerly sitting, he looked at the people around him before giving out a claim.

"I'm not even the pinnacle immortal yet, while those two… while they are not the worst, they are even further away from ascending. How could we know anything about something as major as someone reaching the point of ascendance?"

To tell that I was surprised would be nothing less than I lie. Rather than that, I was shocked, stunned and powerless to react in any way to the notion that I just realised the truth about. Just a moment ago, I could clearly see Bonger's cultivation skyrocketing beyond anything that I saw in my life - the fight that I watched with Makay included. That meant, that not only he reached a point where he could ascend to the higher world just by himself, but also managed to jump this entire stage and proceed even further!

Yet, as I cast my eyes on him right now, there was no doubt that his words were actually true. His cultivation somehow regressed back to being even lower than what he had when I finally reunited with him!

"More importantly, I think that while you might be mistaken about the appearance of an ascendee, I'm almost fully positive that I know what caused this unfortunate misunderstanding."

Feeling the gaze of Bonger landing down on my hand, I unconsciously raised it to my own eyes hoping to find out just what the heck could that system and friend of mine mean.

And this was the greatest mistake that I could subconsciously commit.

"This sword? Isn't it just something ordinary?"

"Doesn't look all that great to me…"

"Stop trying to shift our attention!"

The voices of reason and hate quickly stormed through the crowd, lessening the instant burden that I felt on my persona. With how I wasn't the one to point at the sword in my hand in the first place, no one could blame me for acting in the way I did.

"Let me through. I want to take a look at this sword."

Sadly, my hopes of escaping this situation without attracting too much attention to myself by acting just as confused as the rest of the crowd were broken when an elder that seemed to be the portrait of all the visual bits that would come to one's mind when thinking about a wise old man appeared. His voice instantly made the crowd before him part into two halves, making a neat corridor for the elder to calmly pass through it.

"Dear junior, I hope you wouldn't mind this old man inspecting your weapon? Considering how you either crafted it from… less fortunate materials or just found it directly on this dump, I assume you shouldn't have any qualms against it?"

At this point, I had to make a decision. So far, my entire life was focused either at hiding my true strength away or being plagued with the doubts whether once I would reveal it if I could actually survive the backlash that would inevitably happen. Just because of my wish to steer clear of the troubles, I often missed many opportunities just like the one that presented itself right in front of my hands.

After all, how else could I gauge the overall worth of my crafting skills if not by consulting someone who appeared to be an expert?

"If all you want is to see how good it is, then I do not really mind at all."

Shrugging my arms, I passed the freshly made sword to the old man's wrinkled hand. Seeing how his fingers seemed to regain their vitality once they tightened around the handle of the weapon, I barely managed to hold myself back from smiling.

After all, this was exactly what happened in the legendary series, Patriarch of the Rings, where a powerful sorcerer claimed that an old sect-master would regain his strength only once his fingers would touch the handle of the sword again!

"This is…"

With the entire crowd parting ways to allow the old man to properly inspect the weapon, it was inevitable that everyone turned puzzled when the elder didn't move even an inch ever since his fingers coated themselves around the handle. The old man's forehead quickly covered itself with a huge amount of sweat.

The next moment, his eyes moved up only to land right back on Fen's face. His hand raised in a hesitant move as if he was reluctant to give this weapon back to its true owner.

"Sir… I know this isn't what I was going to do, but would you be willing to sell that sword off to me? I'm willing to pay twenty heavy stones!"

The entire crowd with me and Eve included turned silent. Everyone in this place and within the hearing range of what the old man said turned completely still, even though my and Eve's reasons for doing so were quite different.

"I will pay twenty-three!"

Someone in the crowd shouted, clearly willing to make a bet with the ratification of the old man's words. It seemed as outside of looking like a respectable elder, this man actually had some kind of reputation behind himself.

"Twenty-six!"

"Thirty!"

The number of those… heavy stones quickly continued to grow, all the while I had absolutely no idea what the heck those heavy stones were in the first place. After all, I arrived in this place just a few hours ago, so I couldn't be any wiser about the currency used in this city or literally anything about the details of living in this city in the first place!

"Everyone! Please, calm down for a moment!"

Raising my hands with the sword still tightly held by my fingers, I managed to silence most of the crowd. Or rather, the huge onslaught of voices and noises turned down by a huge notch, allowing me to actually lean towards the old man and ask with a whisper.

"I'm sorry, but I'm still quite new to this city. Would you be as kind as to explain what those heavy stones are in the first place?"